“I suppose they will put us in hospital when we reach the end of our journey, Richardson,” Jack said thoughtfully. “If so, and you are ready to come with me, we will make an attempt at escape. I have been in difficulties in the Transvaal once before, and got out safely.”
“I’ll stand by you and make the attempt at any time,” exclaimed Richardson impulsively. “Anything to get out of the hands of these Boers!”
“Then we’ll take it as settled that we will have a try to get away at the first opportunity,” Jack replied. “We shall have lots of time to talk the matter over, but one thing has occurred to me. We must make believe that we are worse than we really are. That will make any guards placed over us less watchful, and will give us a better chance.”
That evening Jack’s wound was dressed again with the greatest tenderness by the Boer doctor, and on the following morning the oxen were inspanned, and the small commando set off for Pretoria, carrying with them as a trophy the skin of the African lion.
A week later they reached the seat of the Boer Government, and, much to Jack’s pleasure, he was placed in hospital side by side with Guy Richardson, with whom he had already struck up a firm friendship. He had quite expected to be placed amongst the English prisoners, of whom there were unfortunately a large number already; and though he would have been glad to be with them, his plans for escape would have become all the more difficult. As it was, he was surrounded by Boers, and still under the care of the same doctor, who seemed to have taken quite a fancy to him.
Two weeks later he was about, with his arm in a sling, and was able to see what Pretoria was like during these days of struggle. Once, too, the President passed close to him when making a visit to the hospital, and though it might have been merely imagination, Jack fancied that his heavy face bore traces of ever-growing sorrow, and that the broad, stooping shoulders were bowed a little more than usual under a load of anxious care, and under the bitter disappointment of an overwhelming ambition which had been cherished and nurtured for a lifetime. Nor was the President the only one who felt the anxiety of these times of war. The Boer forces, though long prepared for their work, had not swooped down and driven the hated British into the sea. The Dutch population of South Africa had not risen as was expected, and joined their kith and kin to shake off English rule. But instead, Joubert and his hordes of burghers had invaded Natal only to a point a few miles south of Colenso, while in Cape Colony the Free Staters had barely passed the borders, and Mafeking and Kimberley still laughed at the invading forces. It was not a brilliant prospect, when the Boers had hoped to crush the British in three weeks.
They had now done all the invading they were ever likely to do, and though successes might still fall to their arms, though in carefully-prepared trenches and defences they might resist and bear back for a time the relieving-forces now marching towards Ladysmith and Kimberley, yet they knew that those reinforcements would eventually invade the two republics and appear before Bloemfontein and Pretoria just as surely as the earth would continue to revolve.
No wonder, then, that they looked downcast and harassed, while many of them secretly longed for a peaceful termination of the struggle, and a life of freedom under British rule.